A 4-time Academy Award winner, the iconic filmmaker Woody Allen was expelled from New York University after he had failed several exams in cinematography. Yet he wasn’t upset at all — he found studying there boring — and still achieved his goal.

Ursula Burns started her internship at the American Xerox company right after obtaining a master’s degree from the New York University Tandon School of Engineering. The company noticed the young woman’s ambition and hired her as an assistant. Yet by the age of 32, she still held only junior posts.

All her diligence was rewarded 10 years later: first, Ursula was promoted to vice president for global manufacturing, and now she serves as chairwoman of the company.

In 2014, Gabriel Jesus, a Brazilian footballer and forward of the famous Manchester City Football Club, was painting markings on the streets in bare feet before the Football World Cup to earn money. Then he watched his favorite team play on TV and aimed to play for his country one day. And he did it! Now Gabriel earns $80,000 a week and is a very promising player.

The first restaurant of Colonel Sanders couldn’t withstand the competition and went bankrupt. At the age of 65, Harland started traveling around the USA and offering delicious breaded chicken wings to establishments. He was refused exactly 1,008 times. Yet he didn’t give up, and he continued to believe in his chicken’s unique recipe, thanks to which KFC eventually became famous.

The Canadian-American billionaire almost bankrupted PayPal. As a result, he was fired by the board of directors while being onboard an aircraft on his way to a vacation.

16 years later, he managed to buy the domain X.com, which belonged to him earlier and became the basis for the creation of PayPal, for $5 million. His example shows that failures happen so that we can aim to achieve more.

Having worked for slightly more than half a year, Anna Wintour was fired from the post of Harper’s Bazaar fashion columnist because of disagreements with the editor.

The editor-in-chief of Vogue believes that this event encouraged her to achieve more. Since that time, Anna believes that if you’re sure of something or disagree with something, it’s worth defending your opinion because the uniqueness of thinking is always appreciated in work.

Howard Schultz resigned from Starbucks, which was selling coffee beans at the time. His reason for leaving was that his idea to develop a chain of coffee houses wasn’t supported by the management. Howard dreamed of creating something special, combining quality coffee and a cozy atmosphere to make people visit the store again.

2 years later, Schultz bought Starbucks, popularized the brand in the USA, and made the brand known throughout the world.

At the beginning of his career, Stanley Roger Smith, a professional tennis player, got a refusal from the organizers of the Davis Cup: because he was unorganized and distracted, he wasn’t allowed to be the ball boy who returned the ball to the players.

Yet Stan believed that tennis was his calling. He continued moving to his goal and eventually became an 8-time Cup holder in the US team, proving that he was underestimated.

Having graduated from university, Nick founded Funbug: a gaming platform, which, despite great success, soon went bankrupt.

To somehow recover after the failure, Nick went to Australia to surf with his friends. Watching the professional surfers, he came up with the idea of creating a convenient and small action camera — GoPro — which made him a billionaire.

Nick is sure: but for that failure, he would never have turned his hobby into his life’s work.

Soichiro grew up in a very poor family, and he had to help his father from childhood. He didn’t continue his studies after graduation, continuing to work as a simple mechanic. He installed old engines on bicycles and dreamed of making his own motorcycles from expensive materials, with chrome wheels and leather seats.

Dreams come true if you persistently go toward your goals. After a while, Soichiro managed to open Honda, which nowadays produces some of the best motorcycles in the world.